Slightly Less Chaos

After a week in busy Chennai, we were eager for some relative peace and quiet as we headed out of town on the bus. Our next stop would be 2 nights in the town of Mahabalipuram about an hour and a half south of Chennai. All of our hosts and friends recommended this town, famous for its historic stone carvings and surfing, so we figured we should go see it. After that, we would travel an hour and a half further south and spend 5 nights in the Auroville community, an inspiring, bizarre, and unique place. Then we would loop back up to Chennai for a couple days to attend a wedding reception. We’ll try to condense our narrative a bit for this blog post. Although we won’t go into as much detail about all our chores, remember that all those little things like finding bottled water, seeking out air conditioning, determining where and what to eat, and mapping out transit routes continue to occupy a disproportionate amount of our time and energy. Indeed, sometimes it is hard to go the next step to actually see or do anything in an area, when almost all of our energy is taken up with the logistical details. There are many days that feel like, “what did we even do today?” But we’re letting ourselves be okay with that and let it all sink in at its own pace.  

Lunch with Friends

En route to Mahabalipuram, we finally got to meet one of our tenuous Chennai connnections in person! Prasanthi went to high school in Hyderabad with Julia’s dad’s colleague Dr. Mahi. After so many WhatsApp texts we were eager to meet her in person for lunch at her apartment. She works in IT with two colleagues named Lohit and Ashwin, who were in on our group WhatsApp chat as well, so they came too! Finally, her husband and two daughters were around also.

Prasanthi lives in a gated community, with block after block after block of apartment buildings on a big salty floodplain near the sea. There are many such clusters of apartment buildings speckled around this area, and we wondered what will happen to all these buildings with the imminent sea level rise. Indeed, they’ve already been flooded several times. As we approached the buildings in the cab, we gazed out over the wide stretches of marsh, full of reeds and grasses and speckled with trash, dotted with pretty birds standing in the water, strung over with big towers of electrical lines. Stray dogs trotted around and clusters of stray cows and goats nibbled on the grasses and trash piles.

Even though we were in India, we somehow managed to arrive to Prasanthi’s door at exactly 12:57 for our 1:00 lunch. Lohit and Ashwin arrived after a little while and then it was time to eat! Prasanthi had cooked up a full spread of South Indian delights, and just as nice explained how they would normally be eaten (as there is always that nagging stress in restaurants that we are doing it all wrong). First was the dhal, which is dished onto the plate first, along with a drizzle of homemade ghee. Then comes the rice, which one uses to form into little clumps to deliver the dhal to the mouth. After that, along with more piles of rice we dug into the rest of the dishes on our plates: a spicy dish of potato cubes and bell peppers. A savory dish of cooked eggplant cubes. Little savory fried vegetable/legume patties called vada. A delicious tangy buttermilk-based vegetable curry unlike anything we’ve had before. Spoonfuls of Prasanthi’s homemade curd (yogurt). And then seconds and thirds of said items. Per custom, since Prasanthi was hosting she stood near the table while the rest of us ate and dished the items onto our plates as needed. Wow, we can’t imagine how long it took to make it all! But it was divinely delicious!

Before, during, and after the meal we got to know them all a bit more. The IT company that Prasanthi, Lohit and Ashwin work for is enormous, with a jaw dropping 390,000 employees around the world, the entire population of Minneapolis! Lohit showed us an aerial diagram of the company’s Chennai office complex where the three of them work alongside approximately 29,997 other people. WWWHOAAA. It is true, IT is huge in Chennai as well as India in general, and many of the people we introduce ourselves to happen to work in IT.

We also learned a little bit more about Hinduism from our hosts. There is Brahma the creator, Vishnu the guardian of the living, and Shiva the destroyer (and hence also a part of transformation and reincarnation), plus all the other lesser gods and demigods, all involved in a massive complexity of stories. Prasanthi showed us her beautiful shrine in a big cupboard/armoire next to the dining area, full of small beautiful items representing the image or symbolic quality of a number of the different gods. Before we began our lunch, she had placed a sample of each of the foods on a plate within the shrine. It has been lovely to see how integrated into daily life Hinduism is here. All over town there are small beautiful temples tucked into seemingly random nooks between buildings along the roads.

Mahabalipuram

In the late afternoon after our lunch with Prasanthi, we arrived to our guesthouse in Mahabalipuram. Our host Saravanan showed us up to the rooftop terrace for some tea. Overhead was a roof made of woven coconut leaves, bamboo, and wood from the tiger balm tree. It felt like a classic tropical paradise, with The Bay of Bengal beach just down the street, a warm moist breeze, and palm trees all around. It was such a relief to be out of the city. We could breathe deeper. Mahabalipuram is a fishing town, and our guesthouse was in the section known as the “fishermen’s colony.” Indeed, Saravanan grew up here and was a fisherman himself until until a few years ago when his boat broke down and he decided to focus on the guesthouse. As evening fell, we were utterly relieved to go to sleep listening to the chirps of crickets and quiet maraca-like shakes of the other insects, rather than the honking of traffic.

Krishna's butterball (Mahabalipuram)

We had the next day to explore Mahabalipuram. Along with lots of Indian tourists and some Western tourists we visited the incredible historic stone carvings for which the town is famous. Even though we were on a big flat plain by the sea, for some reason there is a big hillside of smooth rocks and boulders, which inspired people of the Pallava dynasty to make carvings and temples in the 7th century. It was incredibly detailed and beautiful work, and even more impressive that they were carved out of a single huge hunk of stone! We also saw “Krishna’s butterball,” an enormous smooth boulder the size of a building mysteriously and amazingly balanced on a big smooth rock incline. In the morning and evening we also took a walk along the beach with all its colorful fishing boats and appreciated the steady sea breeze that made the oppressive heat and humidity not quite so bad.

Being a more tourism focused town gave Mahabalipuram a different feel than our time in Chennai. The well known Indian side-to-side head waggle mannerism that was so ubiquitous in Chennai was uncommon here. There are many more shops selling souvenirs and clothing, resorts scattered along the shore, and more people approaching you to sell you stuff (which we were surprisingly free of in Chennai). But at the end of the day it still definitely felt like we were in India, just a different slice of it.

Auroville

Our next stop after Mahabalipuram was Auroville, a town unlike any other in India or probably the world. Auroville, also known as “the city of dawn,” is an experimental town founded in 1968. It is supposed to be a model for the evolution of human consciousness and a place to experiment with a new way of living. It is intended to be an “international intentional community” where many nationalities can live in unity; a place that, although it is located within the country of India, is not the property of any particular nation but of humanity as a whole. Although the original vision aimed for an eventual population of up to 50,000, it has plateaued around 2,400 people living there today. While a majority of the people are Indian, there are also a significant number of non Indian people from all over the world, especially Europe, who live in Auroville. The community is based on the teachings and guidance of a guru named Sri Aurobindo and a woman called The Mother who studied closely with him. Founded by The Mother, Auroville is intended to be a utopia that realizes human unity and harmony: a society without money, formal government, strife, or need. Sounds intriguing, right? Since we visited Findhorn in Scotland and enjoyed it, we figured Auroville would be an interesting place to compare and contrast as they both are ecovillage intentional communities.

Mahabalipuram cont.

From Mahabalipuram we hopped on one of the frequent buses heading in the direction of Auroville. Although the labeling of the bus as “Super Deluxe” was a little optimistic, it wasn’t nearly as bad as we had feared. It was fun to feel the warm wind on our faces and gaze out the rural landscape gliding by. People worked in the rice paddies, cows nibbled on the scruffy patches of green amidst the red dirt, people fished in the wide river deltas, and worked in gravel yards. The little buildings and huts were cloaked in big coconut thatched roofs, and the roads were lined with endless kiosks advertising Vodafone and Airtel cell products. The music playing on the bus was reminiscent of the music they play at Indian restaurants in the US, so it was fun to have an appropriate soundtrack as we watched the landscape go by.

After an autorickshaw ride into Auroville, the two people who welcomed us to our guesthouse were a Dutch guy and an Indian woman who both grew up in Auroville. With the screened open-air feel of the house, it was lovely to be in the forest listening to the hoots and chirps of all sorts of unidentified birds and bugs. When it was time to find some dinner, and we realized that the nearest restaurant was a 10 minute walk away through rural roads, we began to miss some of the conveniences of the city. For how loud, dirty, and busy Chennai was, at the same time it was so easy to find bottled water and a wide variety of restaurants. Another challenge we discovered would be how to get around. Since Auroville is spread over a radius of at least 5 km in all directions, it is just a bit too large to be walkable. Most people zoom around on the winding rural red dirt roads on mopeds and motorbikes, but were not excited about that for safety reasons. In the end, we ended up renting some rattletrap one-speed bicycles from our guesthouse which did the job alright. But, all in all, once we found our rhythm in Auroville the “oh, no, we are stuck: how are we going to get food and get around?” feeling subsided quickly.

As for Auroville itself, spending five days there allowed us to at least begin to get a grasp of what Auroville is all about. For the first day or two we were completely confused and even a little put off by it. For our first day, we walked a mile through the sweat-drenching heat to visit the visitor center, which was surprisingly unhelpful at answering our questions. For being a large busy compound with a general information office, three boutique shops, a book store, outdoor information panels, a couple cafes, and an exhibit hall, we left with only marginal enlightenment about what Auroville actually is.

The posters outside described a few cool projects like Auroville’s educational initiatives with the local villages, renewable energy projects, and the construction of international villas to encourage international cooperation. However, they were brief and not satisfyingly informative. The exhibits did not help much either: the entire spotless hall was filled with big printed quotations from Sri Aurobindo and The Mother. Although they died about 40 years ago they remain overarching forces in Auroville and their teachings permeate daily life. Anyway, big New Agey photographs accompanied each of the quotations. With titles like “The First Supramental Realization.” Huh??? I mean, all of the quotations were nice, things about being on the brink of a consciousness transformation that will channel the divine into a new level of human existence. But a whole exhibit hall full of nothing but quotes like this? We had no way to interpret this spiritual talk in terms of the outside appearance of Auroville - a big network of red dirt roads buzzing with stinky mopeds and dotted with slightly dumpy buildings and a smattering of NGO-like social enterprises and different experiments.

At this point in our exploration of Auroville, we were frustrated at our inability to find out any substantive information about the community. Even though thousands of visitors pass through every day, there were just a couple phone numbers posted on the board that you could call for a private tour, and there was no scheduled group tour like we enjoyed at Findhorn. Nobody seemed all that interested in talking with us, and there were few opportunities to engage or connect with the community. And as we said before, most of the published information was some sort of New Agey quotation about what Auroville is intended to be. At Findhorn, we could understand how their vision meshed with their actions and functions and reality. In contrast, we were just totally baffled and confused about Auroville. We were having trouble picking up on any of the heart, spirit, community integrity, and positive inspiration that we had felt at Findhorn. Of course Findhorn had just as much scrappiness in its history, but somehow it felt like it had found its stride more than Auroville.

In addition, the big headshot photos of The Mother featured prominently in many buildings (including our guesthouse) gave off a slightly cultish vibe. Although The Mother had no nefarious intentions and had a beautiful vision for the community, the overwhelming presence of The Mother and Sri Aurobindo throughout Auroville definitely didn’t resonate with us. The energy of Auroville felt a bit like the energy of India in general - somewhat disorganized, unclear, scrapped together, incomplete, just holding it together. After our first day we were starting to regret booking a 5 night stay there, feeling that we wouldn’t be able to learn or gain much more. It was definitely not turning out to be the experience we expected.

Nevertheless there are many people from all over the world that are attracted here and describe its “special energy.” So far we hadn’t been able to pick up on that. It wasn’t an unpleasant place but we would definitely not be interested in living here. But we reminded ourselves: hey, that’s what traveling is about - learning what appeals to you and what doesn’t. We just wished we could learn more specifics about it in the meanwhile.

After leaving the visitor center we walked for a long time along the snaking roads to find a new outdoor cafe called The Neem Tree. When we finally arrived dusty and drenched in sweat, we were dismayed when “No cash please” was written on its chalkboard, in alignment with the Auroville vision of a money free society.  We hadn’t gotten over to the financial services center yet to load money onto our “Aurocard”, so we thought we were in a pinch after walking so far. But when we went up to the counter the man laughed amicably, “Money is fine!” That seemed to be representative of the general feel around Auroville. It hasn’t turned out quite as idealistically a it was envisioned. Anyway, we had a nice lunch, a South Indian platter of chapatti, coconut veggie rice, cooked beet and carrot slices, potato curry and a soupy lentil dish, all for the digestible price of 80 rupees each (about $1.20). Then we sweltered back along the pathways to the visitor center, since passes to enter the famous golden Matrimandir dome are issued from 2-3 pm daily for entrance on subsequent days.

Despite our doubts from the uninspiring start of our stay in Auroville, the second full day was much more enlightening. After lots of confusion, go-with-the-flowness, and phone calls that wouldn’t go through, our private tour guides showed up at our guesthouse to take us on a bicycle tour. Both were Indian guys who grew up in Auroville. One, the intended primary tour guide, is an Aurovillian (meaning an official member of the Auroville community). The other guy informally coming along was friend who grew up in one of the many local villages on the edges of Auroville. Fortunately our guides spoke great English and it was so great to see Auroville through the lens of real people who live and work here.

With the two of them, we cruised around the back roads and made many stops to walk around and learn about Auroville’s different enterprises. We visited a musical instrument showroom and workshop, where people sat on the floor at work: polishing wood, assembling the instruments, painting instruments, or tuning the chimes to the right frequency. We visited a spirulina farm, where this algae superfood is grown in cement block tanks like swimming pools, then turned into all sorts of products for health food markets. We visited a big bamboo workshop enterprise where they make and develop all sorts of bamboo buildings, structures, and fences. Next was a cool place called “Well Paper” which employs village women recycling old newspapers into these really cool varnished bowls, placemats, containers, and coasters (like what you see at 10,000 Villages). They also make papier-mâché toy animals out of old plastic bottles.

Next we took a walk through one of Auroville’s many organic farms, this one a lush permaculture jungle. The farm was where the knowledge of the villager tour guide especially shined. He seemed to know what every single plant was good for, not just the well known edible ones like pumpkin, lentil, papaya, or lemon, but also almost every other plant as well: This one’s seeds are good as a topical anti inflammatory paste. Eating this one prevents dengue fever. This one’s leaves are good for increasing bovine fertility. This one is good for arthritis. This one’s flowers are consumed before consummating a marriage. It was so wondrous how almost every single tree and plant we passed, even the weedy or wilder ones, had their own unique value. It made us think how much we must be missing out on in the world of exclusive reliance on Western pharmaceuticals. He said he had learned all about the medicinal value of the plants from his grandfather, and that his family has lived in this area for many generations. It is so cool to think about all this local knowledge that is so deeply connected to tradition and the natural world. He appreciated how Auroville’s farming methods are getting back to the way the villagers have farmed for hundreds of years, working with the cycles of nature, particularly regarding nutrients.

Our next stop wasn’t really “Auroville” but our guides asked us if we wanted to see a temple. Of course! Although Auroville is not associated with any religion, the Hindu temple we visited has been there for a couple hundred years, obviously long before Auroville started. It was along one of Auroville’s many labyrinthine dirt tracks winding through the forest. “I don’t like coming down this road alone or at night” both of our tour guides said, as it is a Temple of Kali and she is the goddess of destruction. In addition to the main temple building there was a little structure off to the side devoted to Ganesh, the god depicted with a round belly and an elephant head. Julia asked about the story behind Ganesh and what felt like about 15 minutes later our guides concluded their story, leaving our heads spinning with stories of complex family webs, beheaddings, demons, gods, and supernatural powers. Goodness, Hindu mythology is complex! Also lining the ground were seven small rocks with colorful pieces of cloth wrapped round them. These are gods, so don’t kick them.

Our final stop was the youth center, a space for Auroville youth to informally gather and undertake projects such as building fantastic treehouses, which people actually live in. Finally our tour wound to a close after about 3 and a half hours. Not only had we seen lots of interesting projects, but even more we finally had a chance to pepper some Auroville residents with questions which they answered in satisfying detail. Here is some of what we learned:

•All of these enterprises that we visited are not privately owned but are owned by the Auroville community and hence humanity at large. Aurovillians and local villagers along with lots of volunteers work here. However, it’s all for the community as opposed to personal gain.

•The idea is that the community provides all Aurovillians with food, health care, free education, etc. In exchange, about 5-6 hours per day work contribution is expected. This schedule ideally allows people extra time and mental energy to develop their higher consciousness through meditation and spirituality, or to spend time in physical activity that benefits the body and mind, or in other community or personal betterment activities. This seems like a nice concept as opposed to our current culture of working ourselves ragged.

•What Aurovilians are paid is not called “wages” but a “maintenance.” It is 15,000 rupees per month (about $235 USD), of which 5,000 goes to back into the community to provide basic social services for its residents, 5,000 is in Indian Rupee cash, and 5,000 is in “Kind Money” (Auroville’s experiment towards the internal circulation of a cash-free economy).

•Auroville is having trouble attracting the young adult age range as many people leave the community to build up personal financial resources. Although Auroville’s stipend is enough to live on, it’s not enough to build savings. Nor does it include the price of a house which Auroville residents must pay for on their own. So somehow people need to have their own source of money as Auroville isn’t currently financially sustainable. They also have contributions from many private donors as well as the Indian government (which is kind of interesting - must have both pros and cons for Auroville).

•Auroville’s governance is made up of a six member council elected by the people, who do a lot of the decision making. There are also smaller elected committees working on particular topics. Forgive the lack of detail; it was kind of complicated and hard to remember!

bamboo workshop

After our tour, the villager tour guide funneled us over to his cafe for a meal. It was a hopping place, with a row of dusty motorbikes parked out front, decorated with bright graffiti style paint, CocaCola posters, a poster of our guide’s favorite local politician, and an outdoor seating area under the pergola. He sat with us for part of our meal, and we heard a few new feelings that hadn’t come up on the tour. He has never officially become an Aurovillian, and alluded to the frustrations of his family having lived in the area for hundreds of years only to have Auroville come in and transform it into Auroville’s own thing. He said his first goal is to put his energy to help develop opportunities in his own village rather than Auroville at large. So here, we heard a different and not so ideal view of Auroville.

Anyway, the guided tour helped us pick up a lot more on why Auroville is a special place. There are lots of cool things happening once you talk with people, get the inside scoop, and actually go through the gates to look at things. We saw only a small fraction of all the projects happening, but it was enough to give us a better sense for the character of Auroville.

The next day, our third day in Auroville, we visited the Matrimandir dome, the center and soul of Auroville and of course one of the “must do” things here. Before going to the Matrimandir grounds, we were first shown a short video about the dome along with the 50 or so other visitors from around the world in our tour. There are a lot of good principles behind Auroville that we really resonate with. For example: a society based on cooperation rather than competition. Where people are valued not by their wealth or social status but by their contribution to the community. Where people can live in unity without divisions based on age, religion, nationality, background, etc. Where education focuses on developing the whole person rather than simply passing exams. Where we might be able to transcend our current strife and selfishness and evolve towards a higher divine consciousness. It is all a really good impulse. Although we have some reservations about Auroville, it still seems like a wonderful ideal to strive for and the soul underlying it is one we can definitely get on board with.

Now for the Matrimandir. After a short shuttle bus ride to the grounds, we all sat on benches under a tree and sweated while our tour guide gave us some more background. His main message was that the purpose of Auroville is working toward human unity. He asked the group to describe different forms this might take: seeing the good rather than the bad in others, being kind to yourself and others, building relationships, focusing on unity rather than differences, and overarchingly Awareness.

We don’t have good pictures of it as you’re not allowed to bring cameras on the tour, but definitely look up a photo online! It is quite spectacular, this enormous geodesic dome orb covered in glimmering golden circles, looking like it’s sprouting out of the earth, with 12 reddish stone lips rising up around it. Inside these 12 petals are 12 meditation rooms, each corresponding to a certain quality such as “sincerity” or “gratitude.” Okay, it is really hard to describe so just look up pictures! If you Google “Matrimandir Aerial” you can get the cool angle from above. The extensive gardens surrounding it are known as the Peace gardens. Everyone is supposed to be quiet and not talk in the gardens or Matrimandir.

Organic Farm

Next we quietly walked through the gardens up to the dome itself. In a silent single file line we removed our shoes and went into the open air area under the dome, sitting in a big circle around a beautiful cascading fountain, a thin film of water rippling down towards a small crystal ball in the center. We sat here in concentration (meditation) for about 10 minutes, then filed back up to enter the most special spot, the inner chamber of the Matridome. It was all pristinely clean. As we silently filed into the first anteroom,  we all put on tall white socks and tucked our pant legs into them. Cleanliness is very important at the Matridome. Next we wound our way up the stairs into the inside of the geodesic dome. It is an enormous chamber, utterly silent, no windows, furnished with white marble and white carpet, dimly lit with a strange reddish orange light, just a touch of futuristic sci-fi. Eerie and bizarre but in a beautiful way. It felt like it would induce a strange revery or trance. In a long line we wound our way up the big spiral ramp, with Aurovillians along the way standing silently to guide and monitor us. Finally it was time to enter the inner chamber, the spiritual center of Auroville. Very dimly lit, the big circular room had white marble pillars, white carpet, and a big circle of white cushions for us to sit in concentration. In the center is a large crystal sphere, representing the soul, with a visible beam of sunlight coming down from the ceiling to illuminate it, representing change. We sat in this room in concentration for about 10-15 minutes, then silently filed down the curving ramp and back outside in our muffled stocking feet. Wow! What to make of it all?

The Matrimandir itself was indeed stunningly impressive. It is bizarre but beautiful, and very futuristic looking. However we both found ourselves appreciating the simplicity of Quaker faith. For as much as Auroville’s spirituality is specifically not intended to be a religion, for some reason the Matrimandir reminded us in its own funny way of all the over-the-top churches we saw in Europe – an external thing that’s designed to elevate people to awe. On the flip side, it is indeed important to have such places of sacredness and quiet for people to connect with spirituality. The Matrimandir just felt a bit to showy for our personal style. But it was really fascinating nevertheless.

Spirulina farm

Another thing we appreciated was that it seems like they’ve done a good job with maintaining the spirit of the Matrimandir. They have specifically set up the tour process to avoid it becoming commercialized. You have to show up in person at least one day before the tour to book it, and can only book for yourself. You are not allowed to take anything into the grounds, including water bottles, cell phones, cameras, bags, etc. The tours are very structured and you are constantly shepherded. You are also not allowed to walk around the grounds after the tour or to go into the meditation rooms; for this you have to do another process to get a pass for a future date. Although we can see why they do this, the downside of this was that it made the Matridome and its grounds feel kind of exclusive and inaccessible.

Once our Matrimandir tour was over we decided to try out the other restaurant owned by our villager tour guide from the day before, with a funky and sketchy sounding name: “Bro’s Plan B.” (???) Anyway it was sort of halfway between a restaurant and a street food stall. A couple of tables under a coconut thatch roof, with more Coca Cola posters and motorbikes parked out front. One thing we have been noticing with the food here is that white rice is really the overwhelming centerpiece of the meal and the vegetable or legume dishes are more just a sauce to flavor the big piles of rice with. A lot of them have actually been kind of watery and unsatisfying, and white rice gets tiring when it’s the overwhelming bulk of every meal. Maybe this is more of a South Indian tendency given the hot climate, so less need for thick sumptuous things. But we’ve actually kind of been missing the food from Indian restaurants at home, which seems kind of silly since we are in actual India!

Our guesthouse

After a chill air conditioned afternoon, we ventured out for dinner. Since it had just gotten dark we didn’t want to go far so we biked over to the closest place, a little family joint called Ganesh Bakery about 3 minutes away. We got a sumptuous  vegetable curry (finally something delightfully thick!) as well as some super yummy masala dosas (dosas filled with spicy saucy masala potatoes and vegetables, served with a flavorful ginger vegetable stew sauce to dip it in). Cute little dogs and puppies ran around the tables playing with each other. The proprietor’s wife came out to ask if we liked the food and sat at a nearby table and chatted with us. Silly me, I asked if she owned the bakery/cafe, but indeed it is all the property of Auroville and hence of humanity as a whole. But indeed, her husband is the main one who runs Ganesh Bakery. She moved to Auroville at the age of 16 when she got married (an arranged marriage we presume) as her husband was Aurovillian. She’s been living here since 1979, and mentioned that back in those days there was more community closeness than there is today. Indeed we’ve been able to feel this as well, as it seems like there are many excellent parts of Auroville but that it is perhaps not as unified as a cohesive community as it might be.

For our fourth and final full day in Auroville and we attended a great tour of Solitude Farm. Solitude Farm is one of many different farms in Auroville. Lots of people showed up for the tour, which was led by the head of the farm, Krishna McKenzie. Barefoot with a ragged turban and loose draped clothing, he was very articulate and had a passionate and well-thought vision for the farm and food system. He’s even done a TED-x talk and was invited to do another one.

First he talked about how our current relationship with food and farming is defined by the “coin” and the intellect, rather than a deep respect and listening to nature. He talked about how we can’t solve our problems by being “clever” - growing carrots on the moon, trendy things like gardens on the vertical walls of buildings, or removing ourselves from the soil in terms of aquaponics. Instead we need to get back to a connection with our own local place and soil. He also maintained that it’s not only the specific techniques of organic farming or green living that are needed: moreover, we really need an overarching paradigm shift in how we see our relationship with food and the earth. He had a three pillared approach: 1. Honoring the health of the soil and specifically organic matter  2. Appreciating the bounty that healthy soil produces (eating and enjoying the produce). 3. Building community around it all - people coming together to share this connection. These are great!

Overall, he emphasized that our food systems and lifestyles must respond directly to our local place. It is impossible to invent a system that will work everywhere. It’s not something that can be created by government or policies or inventions. Instead, change will happen organically from people coming together with receptivity to the character of the very land that they live upon. It will necessarily take many different forms in different places. Beyond food, he also talked about the need for this return to the local in terms of education, music, entertainment, health care - instead of looking always toward the outside, we can ask: what can we cultivate right here in our own place? What does our own community and land have to offer? This message, as well as the whole tour in general, had many similarities with the visions that people like Wendell Berry and Wes Jackson are promoting. A shift of focus toward the local, the small, the diverse. It makes so much sense!

Enough with all the talk, next it was time to see the farm itself. It is a lush tropical food forest. In the style of permaculture they have many intermingled plots and layers with plants of different lifespans and ecological niches. Banana, papaya, and tapioca are some of the longer lived ones, while they also had things like sweet potato, basil, tomato, etc. intermingled. Krishna loved showing us all sorts of different local plants that are highly valuable but that you’d never find in a supermarket. He’s passionate about promoting these things - not just selling them from his farm, but even more, empowering people to grow and gather their own. Things like “chicken spinach” which grows everywhere around Auroville but few people think to eat. It’s one of the super nutritious mainstays of their cafe menu. He pointed out many plants with medicinal as well as nutritional value, shamanic plants used for healing. Krishna talked about seeing the value in all that grows naturally, not just getting fixated on the one particular crop we want to produce.

Another connection was when he talked about the work they do with kids. They have a program where a group of kids can have their own garden plot and learn about utilizing all the plants native to this particular place. He talked about the joy of seeing kids who grew up eating “pasta and olive oil” finding the joy in experimenting with eating and cooking all the local plants and the ones they grew. This reminded me a lot of the Wolf Ridge farm, getting kids excited about where their food comes from and expanding their appreciation for new foods and vegetables.

Finally Krishna brought us to see their larger fields for staples. He described how in a normal year, they are able to do a four crop rotation: Rice, then transplanted vegetables, then dal (lentils/legume), and finally millet. Then the cycle starts again with rice. Interestingly he said they never deep plow the fields with animals, they just weed the surface with hand tools as needed, a no-till kind of system. Hearing about the four crop cycle reminded us that we are not in Minnesota any more where you are lucky to get one full crop! Farming seems completely different here - there are many plants that just grow abundantly almost on their own as long as you plant them and give them water. Everything is eager to grow rather than needing to be coaxed.

Speaking of water, Krishna talked about the frightening lack of monsoon rains in recent years. Over hundreds of years the Tamil farmers have always planted on a cycle based on the moon and seasons, but the past couple years the normal rains have not come as they always do. He said that many of the farmers are now sowing anyway in hopes of the rain coming but that they will need a ton of rain to make up for the drought. It was really saddening to see how climate change is throwing a deep cultural and agricultural rhythm into haywire. Thinking about how most farmers are just getting by in good years, it was scary to think about all the disruptions and suffering that climate change will (and is already) causing. It was particularly impactful to us, having seen in India how it already feels like many people are just holding it together, just getting by. Imagine what will happen as the impact of climate change increases. Despite this, the overwhelming tone of the tour was hopeful. The farm tour was a fascinating way to bridge many of the things we’ve been thinking about in our travels so far into our new location of India.

In the end we were glad to spend 5 nights in Auroville, and indeed could imagine finding many more things to keep us engaged for much longer. There are still many facets of the place to explore. We realized we had been a bit harsh in our initial assessment of it. Once we learned more about all that is happening in Auroville, we realized it is actually a really cool place with many good values and goals behind it and lots of beneficial endeavors. However, we continue to not quite groove with how The Mother is featured so prominently everywhere. Nevertheless, the actual quotes of The Mother seem very enlightened, as well as those of her spiritual partner Sri Aurobindo who worked for Indian independence. However, we just couldn’t quite get over the insular vibe of one particular leader being so highly featured. But we departed Auroville satisfied that we had at least been able to learn a little more about this fascinating place.

Back to Chennai

Next it was time to make the journey back up to Chennai for the wedding reception to which we had been invited. The 3 hour bus ride was not the most fun. The driver really liked his horn this time and would let it out almost constantly in these long blasts that were deafening even when wearing noise cancelling ear plugs. Bus travel is a little unnerving, with all the passing. The general rule is that, as long as you swerve back into your lane before actually hitting the oncoming vehicle, then all’s well that ends well. We are not fans. Also we would never EVER want to ride a motorbike on those roads. Apparently, as long as there’s a shoulder for the oncoming motorbikes to move over to, then it’s OK to monopolize their whole lane when passing.

Anyway we made it safely back into Chennai. It definitely took some psyching up to get back into the city, with that feeling of “uuuuhhh, here we go again!” We had found our groove and comfort and routine in Auroville. Now we were thrown back into the challenge of every little thing being immensely new and challenging. Things like walking down the street looking for the recommended restaurant and feeling completely frazzled and overstimulated. On the other hand, we now had a measure of familiarity with Chennai so it was fun to revisit some of our old haunts and familiar streets.

On the plus side, our Red Lollipop Hostel was super sweet! It seems to be the only hostel in Chennai. It was fun to connect with fellow young travelers from around the world. All the common area walls were covered in inspiring quotes about life from past visitors. It was so nice to not feel totally on our own, to know that other people are going through a similarly overwhelming and exciting experience as well.

Unfortunately the power was out in our dorm from about 1 am until 1 pm so we woke up in the middle of the night feeling all sweaty and hot (we are not ashamed to admit that we are completely dependent on AC). That, coupled with the inescapable traffic noise of being in the city, made for a not so great night of sleep. We were just sweltering all morning wearing our headlamps around the dark room. And this isn’t even the hot season! India can give you a special feeling of being trapped: too hot inside, nothing entertaining to do in the dark without lights or power, too many mosquitoes to get some fresh air in the open air kitchen, too loud and smoggy to go onto the upstairs terrace, nowhere pleasant to go for a walk outside, and couldn’t anyway because Colby was still sleeping and we don’t go anywhere alone in India. Therefore Julia paced back and forth in a foul mood, took a cold shower to stop the queasiness of overheating. For all the charming moments we have described in India, there are also many moments of “uuuggghhh” like this one.

At the wedding

Next we went back to Kavitha and Shritar’s shop to pick up Julia’s wedding reception clothing from the little tailor’s shop next door. Of course in the dressing room Julia put the sari blouse on backwards, pronounced it a good fit, and came out to show it off. Whoops! That gave everyone a smile. But most importantly, it fits the correct direction too.

After lunch (yet another good but similar tasting South Indian vegetarian thali) we spent some time sitting in the park. This was probably the first time here we’ve actually been able to just sit in a public space, relax, and have lots of time to take in the scene. It’s easy to get so fixated on survival and the to do list that you forget to slow down and enjoy what’s around you. Here are some parts of the scene that struck Julia’s senses:

The warm humid breeze tousles the vegetation of the lush tropical plants in the park. The stir in the air is a welcome but fleeting relief from the oppressive heat and humidity. Overhead, lots of dragonflies circulate in the sky as they dine on mosquitoes. The occasional crow caws. Lots of men lie sleeping on benches in their afternoon siesta. Maybe they are homeless? But they don’t have any bags or belongings with them so we think most are probably just napping. The muted honking from the surrounding streets punctuates the air like a many-pitched, many-layered Morse Code. Vehicle motors rumble and putter in the distance. The enormous bamboo tree and mini palm trees in front of us move gently in the breeze. A group of young guys in bare feet, sandals, and shorts have gathered for a volleyball game. The net is time consumingly and painstakingly rigged up between two trees. Then the game begins, interspersed with amicable jostling and gloating about plays and the inevitable lively discussions about rule interpretations, laughter and running to chase after the ball. Young people walk by chatting on their cell phones. People relax at the tables and benches, talking with each other. It’s a peaceful atmosphere. People in Chennai generally seem pretty calm. A tight circle of older women in their saris sit together on the ground, sipping chai and chatting. The chai vendor circles through the park on his bicycle with a few thermoses of tea in his basket. The older ladies finish their break and return to work; evidently they’re the ones who keep the park spick and span. They circulate with grassy hand brooms and sweep rubbish and fallen leaves into big wicker baskets. We listen to the rhythmic swish swish swish of the brooms on the hard packed pinkish dirt. Wondering, what life stories are hidden in those silver hairs? Later one of these ladies, wearing an absolutely stunning purple and gold sari, pulls a wagon piled high with vegetative clippings. A few of the other ladies follow behind to help push and guide it, and disappear around the corner in the distance. More people come and go, along with a couple of stray dogs. One dog’s eyes suddenly light up with delight as it goes bounding, tail wagging, toward someone approaching on the pathway behind us. An older man sits down at the bench and pulls out a pack of crackers for the dog. They must be old buddies! Anyway, it was fun to watch all these little scenes of life unfold, with nothing in particular we had to do except absorb it all.

The Tamil Language

Then it was time to head over to the Arkay Convention Center (a recital hall on the third floor of a random looking building) for a Carnatic music concert that Julia stumbled upon on an events website. We didn’t know exactly what to expect but we thought we’d give it a whirl. The first thing we loved was that the hall was clean, quiet, and had AC. Success.

As for the concert itself, WOW!! The ensemble was made of a male singer, violin, tambura, hand drum, and clay pot drum. It is hard to describe the music; it was mesmerizing and transportive and all-absorbing. The vocalist’s song was made of these incredible tremulating vibrational movements involving his tongue, and the violin would echo with a similar soulful vibrato. The tambura resonated steadily in the background, and the drummers had many chances to shine, with incredibly complex (and fast!) rhythms and using all parts of the drum and all parts of their hand. The group played and sang with incredible skill and intense energy for 2 hours straight with pretty much no break.

When the concert started we were two of only about 10 people in the audience. But by the end, enough people had trickled in that all the seats were filled up! More than 100 people at least. Almost everyone, including ourselves, was keeping time to the beat and moving our bodies a little to the music. Everyone was really engaged. It’s funny, getting used to all the different mannerisms that people have. The musicians and audience members kept shaking their heads, which we usually associate with disappointment or things not being right. Audience members would sometimes throw out their hands palms up, which in the US means exasperation: “come on!” But indeed, they are expressions of approval.

We both felt like we could have gotten even more out of the concert if we were more familiar with the music style and cultural significance. When they began playing some of the songs, a murmur of approval rippled through the audience, like it is some well known or loved song. Of course all of that went right over our heads. Nevertheless it was a rich experience!

After the concert we found a restaurant to eat dinner on our walk home. We had both been craving something high in protein and satiated ourselves with cheese and legumes in the form of delectable mattar paneer and chana masala, both North Indian dishes. We have been wondering how South Indians avoid protein deficiency with how the cuisine is overarchingly made with rice and potatoes.

Wedding Reception

It was finally time to attend our long anticipated wedding reception. Garima and Rohit were the bride and groom. Rohit is… wait for it... Julia’s dad’s colleague’s friend’s colleague’s brother. Going by six degrees of separation this means we are almost as connected to this wedding as any person in the world!   

The reception was held at a fantastically large, super upscale Holiday Inn rising off the street like a gleaming spaceship. The doormen pulled open the doors for us and upon entering we walked through a metal detector and sent our bags through a security scan. Then we were inside, with the strong AC, gleaming floors, soaring ceiling, and spotless everything. What a striking contrast with the rest of Chennai carrying on with life just beyond the walled driveway. But it is a comfort to be in such glamorous places sometimes. It was a similar feeling riding in our deluxe sedan cab over to the hotel, in our quiet AC bubble with backseat music console. It has been kind of weird to feel relatively “upper class” here, but at the same time we can see how it makes people feel like they are special or deserve it somehow.

Okay, we digress! Soon Prasanthi and her 8 year old daughter showed up in the lobby, followed by a couple of her IT colleagues and their little kids, all very cute and entertaining. Fortunately throughout the reception we hung out with this entourage who were similarly “satellite” to the main core group. This allowed us to feel some belonging and not be totally awkward. It was also super handy that English is the common language used amongst everyone. With so many languages in India, English is the default for mutual communication. (In Chennai, of course, Tamil is the primary language. But Prasanthi is from Andhra Pradesh and is a native Telugu speaker, while her colleague is from Kerala and speaks Malayalam, etc…). India is an incredibly diverse country.

Now it was time for the celebration. Even though we are in South India, we got to experience the full over-the-top-ness and dancing of a North Indian wedding. This is because the bride’s family are Marwaris of Kolkata. Marwaris are a strong business community dispersed over several areas of India. Traditionally the groom circles around the bride’s house on a horse accompanied with music and dancing. Here, the bedazzled groom was sitting out the top of a modern-day horse —a white BMW— with a shatteringly loud drum-centric walking band and a big cluster of wildly energetic dancing surrounding it. Inch by inch, the car slooooowly made its circle around the hotel. The men were in orange turban-like head dressings, while the women were decked out in glittering, dazzling, sparkly, colorful dresses.

After a while watching we went back into the lobby with Prasanthi, heads pounding, and in the nearly hour it took them to finish going around the building, Prasanthi and Julia went to the bathroom to change and she expertly draped Julia’s saree. In the future, it will certainly be a challenge to recreate all those different folds and turns and tucks. But it felt so elegant to walk around in (if not exactly agile). Julia also wore the necklace that Kavitha made.

When we heard the thud of the drums approaching outside, we headed back outside to witness the arrival of the groom at the front door. Now he was on an actual white horse, decked out in golden tapestries. The energy of the wedding party was incredible given that the different wedding events have already been going on and off for a few days. Prasanthi found out today that the wedding ceremony itself will actually happen in the middle of the night tonight, although she thought it already happened (as weddings, of course, usually happen before the reception). Huh! Anyway the ceremony itself is just for the close family, so all of our group headed home around 11:00.

After the groom dismounted from his horse, we all headed up the elevators to the reception hall upstairs. The speakers played some sort of Indian pop party music with bass notes that made your whole body vibrate. Up front people clustered around the bride and groom on the stage, taking photos and watching them do something subtle we couldn’t quite make out, the bride placing a garland around the groom’s neck.

Next it was time for dinner, an enticing buffet of vegetarian North Indian dishes (my long running childhood dream for my own wedding!). As we ate and chatted, the music continued with the bride and groom on display up front for much of the time. Then it was time to greet the bride and groom and wish them well, so we traipsed across the stage with our group, congratulated two people we had never seen before on their wedding, and posed with them for the professional photographer along with our group. Eventually people began to trickle off and we all decided to call it a night since the kids had school tomorrow. Although we only got to attend a segment of the wedding we are still fully glad we made the effort, as it was quite memorable and we got a taste of the famous “Indian wedding” experience.

Back at the hostel we really wanted to crash into bed. But it was time to pack up our stuff, book a place to stay in Kochi the next night, and at 2 am call an Ola to take us down to the station to begin a 15 hour train ride. Goodbye to Chennai, a second time!